There are walls in my home
I covered with the detritus
of my long folded age.
You scan the roosters.
The Busch Gardens
Characters. Three televisions.
There are the birds. Cackling. All the clocks
I collect. Only one or
two valuable. I collect
meaningless
hopeless
Creaks.
My old joints resist the
morning. Today I will
dust. I will twist my
mind away from the
relevance of you.
As I do everyday.
As everyday morphs
the symbols of a life
unearned.
A conversation un
finished, memory
whose cellophane
crinkled is gone
With the wind.
I Am a cliche. Your
protection is irrelevant.
You can turn my face
away, take off my
clothes.
Look for the cancer
taken from me, The
Cure.
Apply your hands to
me, that in the end
may
Bless
Tomorrow.
Caroline Shank
May 30, 2026
4d ago
May 30, 2026 at 8:53 AM UTC
To all the boys I've loved
before.
To all the times I've waited
before.
The strands of misfortune
waved the way.
Always waiting, the stunning
waste of it.
I write my poems.
Time was time mattered
Now I write as a prayer,
as a song, to all the boys
I've loved before.
To time's excoriating
waste.
Not the songs or the
dreams that just missed.
The classes once,
The thrown away
***
The confessions of
a young Catholic
girl.
To all the ******* waste
of time with which my
mind is layered,
I crush it out.
Caroline Shank
May 8, 2026
May 8
May 8, 2026 at 2:58 PM UTC
I think of you and I think
Of dying. Of your eyes
So vacant, gone. Not
ever to see me again.
The tears, the Cataract of
Our Lives.
The trench that survives.
The underbelly opens.
Stairs of dirt and
Petals. The crushed
detritus cuts my hands.
“Do I dare to eat a peach?”
Will
you still love me tomorrow?
The music that you
shudder, a
throe.
My heart trembles.
Caroline Shank
May 6, 2026
May 6
May 6, 2026 at 5:48 PM UTC
What Would I Say
to you now? Ruptured
is the memory
of you who called me
glad in
the
open air of summer.
In the winter I was
wrapped in the linen
of
your existential
syllables.
But I cannot package time
as can you,
who disappeared
as sugar in warm water.
I stir in the memories.
The
denial
at the cross.
You
knew
of my oneiromantic
slumber.
They caused
but a shrug
from you
who once said
I Do
I see
your image
in the
unhonorable
thrall,
the unbearable
stocastic
Chance.
Alone.
Caroline,
April 22, 2026
Apr 23
Apr 23, 2026 at 7:43 PM UTC
\.C.'Blue is not my favorite
color.
Circles of sapphire
worn by /
11/lonely
women
Whose husband's memory
Failed with
yesterday's
sports scores.
Break my heart with temptation.
I will love you no matter
what .
Caroline Shank
March 2. 2025
Mar 23
Mar 23, 2026 at 1:02 PM UTC
It's early morning and I
spend this time of colors
brightening and sounds
resonating.
Of plans still shaking
off the dew which overnight
brought life to tomorrow.
You are
kisses reflected on my
waiting tears. With hugs
waiting in my arms
for you.
The Pleasure of this are the
moment radicalized. I
will never let you go.
Parades of Angels
pass over me. Send
your music.
.
Test me not too long
alone Beauty is
Loves indulgence.
Time is
Layers against
Our bodies, warm with
Each other
Rainbowed
Caroline Shank
March 8 2025
..
Mar 23
Mar 23, 2026 at 12:50 PM UTC
Grief
Grief is a Pedestrian which
lives under the curbs. Our tears
are the rain.
Pain grows.
Love is a circle.
Pain
drains
somehow your
Soul.
Your Soul waters you and
you can't walk.
Pain is an Illusion.
Until it's not.
We melt into
Pandora's cast away,
Hope
We meet that other
Pedestrian
Love.
We go on
Caroline Shank
March 18. 2026
Mar 18
Mar 18, 2026 at 8:25 PM UTC
I lost your
beauty so long ago.
Youth burst from the chrysalis.
It's ebullience breathing through
transparency. Veins
soft sketches, almost
sharing a new
vision.
The journey I flew
was through the
silk of skies and the
yellows of early dew.
Today's
unrelenting
push to old age.
I am remembering you
who left when I was
not ready. Time
is a scar on the scrapbook
washed mornings. .
My aging butterfly not
glistening now but scrapes
of flowers, my aches
are echoes.
I was wrong. You were
not aware of my wings.
Butterflies were my
companions when each
Spring moved on wheels.
You never knew.
Butterflies now are
little ticks of old wings.
Sorrow the
yellow tears after
long flights when
you were unaware
Of
How
Much
I Needed
You.
Caroline Shank
3.13.26
Mar 13
Mar 13, 2026 at 7:14 PM UTC
You are a ramble on her
life. A long time walking,
hands together.
Once I gave you 40 points.
Each point a footprint.
Each thought a consideration,
I hear you through the lens
of familiarity. She is the
mother of years gone
and years ahead.
19 points of admiration.
Of years. Full of the
pillows shared.
Care is only the link
to your rendition of
a long life of tearing
the rambles and
the roses.
19 points added to the
40 take away something
Forgotten.
Scores linger, a way
of saying you love in
special ways, not a
game but
A gratitude loved
every day.
Caroline Shank
March 6, 2026
For Tom Bartz
Husband.
Mar 6
Mar 6, 2026 at 1:33 PM UTC
Sad Song
(“Don’t you remember you told me you loved me baby”)
I was young in the petals of time, you were the
flower-picker. I was not yet gone purple, just the
pistil side of color, and you, you drenched my
stem with your blue eyes. I remember you told
me you loved me baby.
I said yes. I promised the rain wouldn’t fall
on us. I called you baby. Don’t you remember
I told you I loved you baby? In the earth I felt
your kiss run through me as sap, and I grew
to wrap flowers around us until, with one last
cry your name burst from me like a sun. Don’t
you remember you told me you loved me baby?
Then the wind screamed in your backyard.
And the rain pelted down in your backyard.
And all the colors ran. The ground
washed away. The night was bleeding
and darkness flew at me as I called from
the porch.
I kissed you goodbye in a white gown,
in a lonely hospital room,
waving fallen flowers out the
window like a flag.
I remember I loved you baby.
I said I’d be home again maybe.
I didn’t know it would take
half my life to tell you.
Tattered petals sometimes
sing sad songs.
July 5, 2000
Feb 19
Feb 19, 2026 at 10:10 AM UTC